"Their aim is to destabilize Syria, their aim is to change the government, to topple the government, and to bring their puppets instead, so they will do everything, for them the end justifies the means, no values, no morals at all, anything could happen," Assad said.
The Syria president also commented on the reported chemical attack in Idlib, saying that the incident was a "false flag play just to justify" the attack on a Syrian airbase.
On April 4, a chemical weapons incident in Idlib claimed the lives of some 80 people and inflicted harm on an additional 200 civilians. The Syrian National Coalition of Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, as well as a number of Western states, accused the Syrian government troops of carrying out the attack, while Damascus refuted these allegations.
According to Russian political analyst and expert in the Middle East Karine Gevorgyan, the West is continuing its strategy to delegitimize the Syrian government led by Assad.
"It is still unclear what happened in Idlib, and the fact that Assad was called an 'animal' [by US President Donald Trump] proves that there are attempts to delegitimize the Syrian president," Gevorgyan told Radio Sputnik.
She underscored that once Assad is delegitimized Russia’s presence in Syria will be delegitimized too.
"Apparently, there are those interested in prolonging the conflict. There is an attempt to minimize the efforts of Moscow, Tehran and Damascus and delegitimize this three-party coalition. […] They cannot simply ask Russia to withdraw, this will not happen. So, the West is trying to find tools to squeeze the Russia-led coalition from Syria," Gevorgyan concluded.
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